Private Refugee Sponsorship and Funding in Canada

2015-16 – refugee settlements

In 2015-16, OCRA worked with First United Church Ottawa and Jewish Family Services to co-sponsor refugees identified by the Government of Canada under the Blended Visa Office-Referred (BVOR) program. OCRA’s 12 Family Support Groups worked with 12 groups of refugees identified under this program. OCRA supported these individuals for the first year after their arrival, as they built new lives in Canada. BVOR is a cost-sharing arrangement where the costs of sponsorship for that first year are split between the government and the private sponsor group.

2017 and forward – private sponsorship of close family relatives

Now that the refugees sponsored by OCRA Family Support Groups have settled in Ottawa, the most pressing concern they have expressed, over and over again, is for their close family relatives living in very vulnerable circumstances in Lebanon, Jordan and Turkey. Working with First United Church Ottawa, OCRA Family Support Groups have identified these family members as the refugees that we hope to sponsor for settlement in Canada in 2017 and forward. In Canada, groups like OCRA are permitted to privately sponsor specific refugees.

Private sponsorship requires sponsors like OCRA to provide all of the financial, social and emotional support a refugee group will need for their first year of settlement in Canada.

In order to sponsor and help settle the family members of OCRA’s settled refugees, we must therefore raise the funds and obtain the resources for private sponsorship of named relatives. Please DONATE.

Funding required for private sponsorships

OCRA must raise the funds to financially support each refugee or refugee family that we sponsor to come to Canada. We raise funds based on the government’s financial guidelines for private sponsorship. Learn more about our fundraising objective and progress.

The following table is taken from the Government of Canada’s Financial Guidelines for private sponsorship.